


Look, bubbles!

by ElDiablito_SF



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Annoyed lesbians, Bathtubs, Drunkenness, M/M, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-10
Updated: 2017-06-10
Packaged: 2018-11-12 09:05:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,779
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11158674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElDiablito_SF/pseuds/ElDiablito_SF
Summary: Max fetches Flint to inform him Silver is an embarrassment.





	Look, bubbles!

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ellel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ellel/gifts).



> I was too lazy, once again, to come up with a proper title for the "Look, bubbles!" Tumblr prompt. Also, I decided it was a darn tootin' shame that Max and Flint never spoke to each other on the show.
> 
> This takes place between seasons 2 and 3.

“Captain, a word?”

Flint turned to find a woman standing behind him, wearing far too elegant a dress for such a hellhole, or so the tavern had begun to appear to him post the events of Charles Town.

“You’re Eleanor’s… uh… replacement,” he said, recognizing the Madame and the new proprietor of Eleanor’s business. Rackham and Bonny’s wily little partner. Who helped fuck him.

“Max,” she smiled a benevolent smile at him.

“I remember you,” he said, unable to hold back a scowl.

“It’s about your quartermaster,” Max said, familiarly winding her arm into his and drawing him away from the bar.

“What’s he done?” Flint growled. He wouldn’t underestimate Silver’s ability to still somehow fuck shit up for him, even short one leg. The pirate alliance in Nassau was far too new and too fragile to toss away. He batted down the sudden pang of worry that crept into his belly as he allowed Max to lead him across the walkway and… towards the brothel. “Jesus, don’t tell me he’s killed one of your workers.”

“It is nothing like that,” Max spoke quietly. “It is simply a matter that I thought best dealt with by you directly, lest word got out.”

Well, that wasn’t terribly reassuring. Flint sighed. “Is he all right?”

“He is unharmed,” Max said, and that, too, wasn’t terribly reassuring.

“Christ,” he muttered, following her down the corridor, past the sounds of overzealous fuckery that emanated through the thin walls.

She stopped before one of the rooms, gesturing for him to halt while she knocked on the door: three short taps and one loud one. The door opened, and through the crack Flint beheld Anne Bonny’s threatening scowl, which melted into a soft smile as she nodded and stepped aside to allow them free passage inside.

“After you, Captain,” Max nodded, gesturing for Flint to enter. 

In the bedroom, he beheld a curious sight. By the large bed stood a brass washing basin, surrounded by a large puddle where a peg leg lay sprawled in a state of half-drowned melancholy. A mop of wild curls spilled over the lip of the tub. The mop of curls appeared to be - Lord aid him - singing some kind of a sea shanty that Flint would scarcely want to contemplate where Silver may have picked up.

Flint looked over at Max, who stood quietly by Bonny’s side, both their faces unreadable and entirely unhelpful. He took a few more steps closer, circling to the foot of the tub, where Silver lay in all his disrobed glory, hands slapping like the fins of a struggling fish against the surface of the bath water.

“Silver,” Flint said, not certain what exactly he was expected to do with the “situation” unfolding before him.

A pair of limpid blue eyes slowly rose to fix upon his nose. “Look, bubbles!” Silver offered, with an idiotic grin spreading over his face.

“What am I supposed to do with this?” Flint finally asked.

“He showed up in my room,” Max began to explain a bit helplessly, “drunk out of his mind and raving. We haven’t been able to get him to leave since.”

“And whose idea was it to give him a bath?” Flint asked, eyes still taking in the sight before him. This sight, although not particularly uplifting, was nevertheless not entirely unpleasant.

“His own,” Bonny ground through her teeth.

“I did not think it was wise to allow your men to see him like this,” Max continued. 

“So, let him prune in there, what do I care?” Flint snapped. “Surely you two can find another place to shack up for the night,” he smiled at Max and her little partner with all his teeth.

“Get ‘im out, or I’ll fetch Jack and Vane next,” Bonny snarled. “He’s yer quartermaster. That makes ’im yer bloody problem, don’t it?”

Flint’s hand twitched towards the hilt of his sword, mirrored immediately by the quick movement of Anne Bonny’s hands. Their alliance, he reminded himself, was still far too fragile to throw away over one drunk, naked quartermaster, playing with bath bubbles in the middle of some Sapphic inferno.

“Fine,” Flint muttered, relaxing his hands. “Just… give me some time to get him decent again, and I’ll get him out of your… hair.”

“I would appreciate it, Captain,” Max smiled again, taking Bonny by the hand. “We’ll be downstairs if anything…”

“Go,” he interrupted her.

“Come, Anne.” 

Flint watched Bonny follow the Madame out the door, her scowl once again melting under that soft, expert touch. With the women both gone, and the door closed tightly behind them, he let out another defeated sigh and sank down upon the unmade, ruffled bed, letting his head sink into the hold of his own hands.

“God damn it, Silver,” he muttered, addressing neither particularly the man in the tub nor whatever deity kept dangling this man before him, like some exotic and most certainly forbidden fruit.

“God damn it, Silver,” the pruning nuisance echoed him from the tub.

“What are you, a fucking parrot?” Flint snorted, raising his head and looking the man before him over from head to his one remaining set of toes, that dangled over the edge of the tub.

“Caw-caw!” Silver replied. “Wish that I were, Captain, wish that I were. For were I a parrot, I could spread my wings and fly the fuck far, far away from here. Do you think parrots need two legs to perch? I suppose it might be an inconvenience.” Silver once again clapped his hands against the surface of the water, sending soap suds either which way.

“You’re making a mess,” Flint pointed out a bit despondently.

“Aye, that is my specialty,” Silver nodded and graced Flint with a wide eyed grin. “Can we stay here?” he suddenly asked. “I like it. ‘S quiet.”

“Quiet,” Flint repeated, just as his ears picked up reinvigorated sounds of a squeaking bed and amorous grunts from beyond the wall. “Jesus, how much did you have to drink, Silver?”

“Not nearly enough, if you ask me,” Silver replied with that same grin. “I can still feel my legs. Both of them. Which, in itself, is disconcerting.” One of his arms reached from the tub towards Flint. “Can you check, Captain? It hasn’t grown back, has it?”

“Only if you’re secretly part lizard,” Flint replied, his furrowed eyebrows softening. He slinked down from the bed and sank to the wet floor by the side of the tub. “Silver, I need you to help me get you out of there.”

“No,” Silver pouted. “Not out. In. Stay here with me, Captain.”

“The water’s surely grown cold. You might catch your death.”

“In the infernal heat of Nassau?” Silver asked with an air of a highly offended individual. His arm moved again, trailing across Flint’s shoulder. “Huh,” he muttered with a dazed look.

“Come on, Silver.” Flint gathered himself and leaned over the tub, allowing his arms to dip under the water and lock behind Silver’s back. “Let’s go. Put your arms around my neck.” Why exactly was God testing him like this? Oh yes, probably because God, too, as well as the King, was incredibly offended by his existence.

Blessedly, his quartermaster did as he was told, for once, lifting up his arms and circling them around Flint’s neck, like a very amiable python. Silver reached up and rested his forehead against Flint’s own and closed his eyes, apparently in no rush to actually be lifted out of the tub.

“Put your leg back in and push,” Flint suggested.

“Nah. This is nice, too.” Silver’s hand brushed against the freshly shaven skin of Flint’s skull, shocking him. He had not grown entirely used to the feel of it yet since he had updated his look, and having another man’s hand on the exposed, vulnerable skin left Flint unbalanced. “Prickly,” Silver muttered.

Flint could at this point let the man go and step away from the tub. He could very easily walk out of that room and leave Max and her lover to follow through on their threat of fetching his new partners (who have all fucked him repeatedly). These all seemed like very logical and achievable choices. Instead, he closed his eyes and allowed Silver to continue touching the back of his head with those long fingers while his body lay exposed and wet in Flint’s unexpected embrace.

“Do you ever think about kissing me?” Silver asked, his arms tightening around Flint’s neck. “Because I do. I mean, you. I mean, I think about kissing you. All the time.” Silver’s breath tickled the hollow of Flint’s neck. “Which is kind of suicidal of me, really. I usually have much better self-preservation skills than that.”

“Do you ever shut the fuck up?” Flint practically moaned. He pulled upwards, attempting to drag Silver bodily out of the tub, with or without his assistance.

“James Flint,” Silver muttered, his head rolling back, his body limp and clinging at the same time. “You’re so strong, Captain. God, how are you this strong?”

“I’m mostly powered by rage and a festering sense of my own superiority,” Flint explained with a grunt as he fell backwards into Max’s bed, pulling Silver’s unhelpful body along with him.

“That sounds right,” Silver purred against his ear, wetly - God help him - cuddling up against Flint’s side. “But I’d still really like to kiss you.”

“Perhaps when you’re sober,” Flint protested, weakly, attempting to brush the other man off.

“Again, when I’m sober,” Silver mewled amicably, pressing his open mouth against the thin material of Flint’s shirt where it barely covered his shoulder after all the effort of reeling that unwieldy fish out of the water.

Silver’s body was already beginning to warm to the touch, the sheets absorbing the moisture from his skin, and Flint smirked at the thought of Max and Bonny finding their sheets somewhat worse for wear upon their return.

“You’re really good at this, you know,” Silver spoke again. It was strangely good to see him like this, pliant and with that smile of contentment on his handsome features which had been so oft marred by agony in the past months.

“At what?” Flint asked, breathlessly.

“Taking care of me.”

Perhaps it wasn’t such a big deal, in the grand scheme of his moral transgressions, especially of late. Flint wrapped one arm around Silver’s naked, narrow waist and pressed him closer, letting their lips touch with gentle uncertainty. After everything that Silver had stolen from him, perhaps the least he could do in return is steal a kiss back. Even if only one of them remembered it in the morning.


End file.
